


Serenity

by 1848pianist



Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Gen, Religion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-30
Updated: 2013-11-30
Packaged: 2018-01-03 01:41:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1064182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1848pianist/pseuds/1848pianist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Serene: adj. peaceful or tranquil; calm; clear, as of weather</p>
            </blockquote>





	Serenity

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place mostly during the time when Athelstan is taking care of the house with Bjorn and Gyda, dealing with the relationship between Athelstan and Gyda.

“ _Our Father…What does that mean?_ ”

“ _It means that God is your father.”_

“ _But I already have a father._ ”

“ _On Earth, yes. But also in Heaven._ ”

“That’s enough,” Bjorn snaps, already commanding and self-confident at the age of twelve. “Ragnar is the only father we have. We don’t need your god.” They were an insult, those words.

“I want to hear about Athelstan’s God,” Gyda said shyly. She may have appeared timid, but she had courage enough to stand up to her brother’s ruling.

“It is silly,” Bjorn told her. “A story, for children.” He sneered, looking at Athelstan challengingly. Athelstan sighed. Slavery, he could perhaps learn to tolerate. Running an entire household, especially one with Bjorn in it, was a different story.

“ _I’m_ going to go do something useful. When my father returns, at least he’ll find that _someone_ was looking after the house,” Bjorn announced self-importantly.

Gyda watched him go, waiting to be sure he was gone before turning back to Athelstan. “Tell me more about the prayer, the one you said before we ate,” she whispered eagerly.

“It’s called the Lord’s Prayer,” Athelstan explained, glad to have someone to talk to about his faith, even if only to a ten-year-old girl who was driven more by simple fascination than religious conviction. “It’s how we were taught to pray by God. Do you remember how it goes?” Gyda nodded. At least she was open, not hostile. What was to say that she would not one day decide for herself?

“At least, I remember part of it. It sounds a bit like some of the prayers Father prays to Odin. We call him the All-Father, did you know?”

“I did,” Athelstan replied, still bewildered by the fact that their two beliefs could have such startling similarities. “I learned of your gods and their histories when I travelled as a missionary, as I learned your language.”

Gyda smiled shyly. “I overheard you telling Father about Christians before he left. Athelstan, what is it like in England?”

Ragnar had asked Athelstan similar questions, but when he asked it felt like more a test than interested conversation.

“Some things are much the same as here, I suppose. But some things are very different.”

“Like what?”

“Well, your gods, for example.”

Bjorn appeared suddenly in the doorway. “Gyda, are you going to sit there talking all day? We should be working and getting ready for Father to come home. You, too, priest.” He turned, stalking back out of the house.

“I don’t think they are so different,” Gyda said softly as she followed her brother outside.

 

Gyda came back inside from the fields a few hours later, holding something cupped between her hands. She pulled at Athelstan’s sleeve to turn his attention from his own work, revealing a young hatchling in her other hand.

“It was on the ground outside. Bjorn wanted to get rid of it, but I think we can save it.”

Athelstan examined the bird. As a monk he had received some perfunctory medical training, but only for human care, not avian. This bird, it appeared, had an injured leg, though it didn’t seem to be broken.

“We can try,” he reassured her. “Do you know how to make a splint?”

“I think so,” Gyda said, handing the bird gently to Athelstan and rushing off to find supplies. She returned moments later and began working busily on the miniature splint. Bjorn scoffed at their efforts, declaring it was useless to waste food on a bird that would probably die anyway until Gyda sharply pointed out that the bird would hardly eat much and wasn’t doing any harm.

When the splint was finished, Gyda held the nervous hatchling steady while Athelstan carefully braced the bird’s leg. It gave off chirps of alarm, but relaxed at Athelstan’s careful touch. Gyda had also found an unused cage somewhere, and had made it as comfortable as possible for their new member of the house.

“Did you learn about medicine in England?” she asked, feeding the bird small bits of various plants, trying to find which one it liked best.  

“A little,” Athelstan replied. “Not much concerning birds, though.”

Gyda smiled. “Enough, though. We’ll feed it the grain that we don’t need, and let it go when it can fly again.”

Athelstan smiled back, realizing he how little he smiled now.

 

Days later, Athelstan realized guiltily that his hair was beginning to grow. It was yet another constant reminder that things were not as they should be.

He prayed, often and increasingly hopelessly, that he would know the reason for his sudden, permanent exile to this harsh, hostile place. If he had been sent here by God to teach these people about Him, he suspected that he was the wrong person for the job. He knew the language, true, but he was young and relatively inexperienced, exactly the opposite kind of person to earn the respect of these strange and violent people. He was the only one of his monastery that had been to their lands, yet he had little enough understanding of their ways; certainly not enough to convert anyone, surely? It would be a miracle if even one would accept the Word. He prayed for guidance and only felt further away.

He heard footsteps behind and turned to see Gyda looking concerned.

“Is something wrong?” he asked.

“You always look so sad,” Gyda said, sitting down beside him. “Do you miss England very much?”

“I suppose I do, yes,” he answered.

Gyda seemed incongruous with this hostile place, he thought. She was the only one who spoke with him with interest, and the only one entirely devoid of cruelty. She was easily the most open to God’s Word, out of all the Vikings he had met, but he could never see her as a convert. His mission was to bring salvation. Gyda did not need saving.

The girl looked up at him, seeming hesitant. “Would you go back if you could?”

“Yes.” _Let the children come to me_ , Jesus had said.

“Even if there’s nothing left?”

“Yes,” he replied again, looking away.

Gyda contemplated this, tangling her fingers in the grass. She drew her knees up under her chin, gazing at Athelstan anxiously. “Do you really hate us that much?”

Athelstan almost laughed, out of shock. “I don’t hate you, Gyda. Everything is just very… different here.”

“Bad, different?”

Athelstan shrugged. “Sometimes.”

“Oh,” she said, going back to fiddling with the grass. “Your hair is growing,” she noticed.

Athelstan looked away quickly, trying to force back tears, though he felt near tears constantly in this place. He didn’t want Gyda to see him crying, knowing she’d think it was her fault. He felt Gyda’s hand on his arm, pulling it gently away from his face.

“Athelstan,” she whispered. “Athelstan, are you alright?”

Before he could answer, she put her arms around him. Surprised, but grateful for the gesture, he let her.

 

As much as possible, he worked, numbing his mind with the sheer backbreaking of running a house and a farm. This, at least, pleased Bjorn. When there were no chores to lose himself to, Athelstan found himself staring east towards the sea, where Ragnar and his men were no doubt plundering another monastery like his own.

And there was Gyda, rushing to join him in lifting a heavy load or help with the washing, and sometimes just to sit and stare out at the changeable, unfeeling, infinitely calm ocean.

 

Sometimes they would talk of her home and her life, and Athelstan would learn more from her than he ever could as a missionary.

At other times, they talked of England, and he found that talking was far better than brooding.

Once, she brought him flowers, picked from the fields before the first frosts of winter.

***

But it couldn’t last, could it? The plague takes all, and disease was caused by more than physical sickness. He could no longer believe himself above these people and their ways, and no longer knew if he wished to be. And Gyda, the spark of humanity he had found, was gone.

Perhaps the Vikings were not as terrible as he had found them at first. Perhaps, given time, he would befriend Ragnar and with Lagertha and the others, and begin to understand their ways. Perhaps he would throw off what he now felt as the shackles of his old life, get rid of the guilt and the obligation, and find something better than what he had always known. But what was the point, if he no longer wished for it?

During the plague, he had grown used to finding cold hands and glassy eyes, real or dreamed, but not Gyda, never Gyda.

There was little enough faith left in him, but something still cried, “Oh God, why?” Weeks of prayer left unanswered, and the knowledge that death was final, that there was no heaven and no salvation. Riddled with doubt, all he had left was the wish for belief and the guilt of losing the very thing he had dedicated his life to. What loving and merciful God would abandon him here and take away all of which he was certain?

He sat alone, too angry for tears, and cursed his own naivety and inability. He was trained in medicine, intended to be a healer of body and soul, but he didn’t save her. It wasn’t enough, this time, as it had been for that broken bird from so long ago. _Let the children come to me_ , Jesus had said. Well, if there was a God, she was there now…

He remembered, faintly, the prayer he had taught her when her brother was occupied elsewhere. He could almost hear her recite it back, hesitantly, wondrously:

 

_Our Father, who art in Heaven_

_Hallowed be thy name_

_Thy kingdom come, on earth be done_

_On earth as it is in Heaven._

It was not a cure. It was by no means a revival. But for now it was a bridge over the ocean between their two worlds, a child’s prayer, a mantra. He could not bring himself to believe it, not now, but for the moment it was shelter enough from the waves underneath. For now, serenity.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been working on this since the end of season one but I think I'm finally satisfied with it.


End file.
